Terminology Tuesday

Several weeks back, I talked a bit about elements featured in the design phase of course development, and now I’ve returned to finish off (the high-level) discussion.

Previously, I talked about design documentation. Now I’m going to focus more on the technology and visual elements.

Within the design phase, this is typically where I would identify an authoring tool or Learning Content Management System (LCMS). Where will the development occur? Will the course be developed in Articulate Storyline? Adobe Captivate? Flash? An internal LCMS? This should be identified before anyone moves further into the development phase. Why? Because the development tool selected may impact some of your specifications in your design documentation. For example, if you specify one authoring tool in your design documentation, but use another, your client might hold you accountable for not doing what you said you were going to do.

Once selected, this authoring tool specification will help you out when coming up with a style guide (e.g. what screen styles you’re planning on using) and will be instrumental in specifying prototype requirements and compliance requirements. If your project requires SCORM compliance, you’ll want to ensure the authoring tool you select has that capability…or redevelopment might be in your future.

Another element you might want to consider during the design phase is to outline your course content. High level is usually best for this.

From a higher education perspective, the design phase is where I would have faculty members begin populating a Course Development Plan document. This document acts as a container for specific high-level course content, and facilitates and easier transition during the development phase. For example, this document (once complete) will have most all of the content housed within the document (and signed off on), and the faculty member can then copy/paste the textual content into the Learning Management System (LMS) instead of having to spend time retyping/researching what content they want to include in which module. It just streamlines the development process.

For design, I think a good rule of thumb would be to outline as much information about the project requirements and high-level course content as you can, because it will make for a smoother development phase!

Over the past two weeks, I’ve talked quite a bit about the analysis phase of most Instructional Design models, and now it’s time to talk about the Design phase.

But I’m not a designer!

Oh. But you are! At least if you claim to be an Instructional Designer. Like analysis, many IDs don’t get the opportunity to dip their toes in the design phase, but it’s a very important phase to be a part of.

While it might sound as though we’re talking graphic design and look/feel, we aren’t exactly. Only sort of. The design phase is where you identify how the learning is going to occur. So the look and feel…conceptually. And it may also include elements of visual look and feel.

The output of this phase is typically referred to as ‘design documentation’. This documentation outlines things such as:

• Instructional Strategy
• Learning Objectives
• Assessment Strategies (and sometimes the assessment items)
• Prototype Requirements
• Compliance Specifications (e.g. system requirements for the end user and SCORM requirements)
• Branding Guidelines
• Screenstyles

The design documentation is used to guide the design and allows developers to keep their eyes on the prize (or the project requirements). It also allows multiple developers to ensure a consistent approach across development.

Have I piqued your interest?

Great! Stay tuned for more on the design phase…next!

Last week I started a discussion about Analysis, talking about some elements (e.g. Needs Assessment) and some strategies for conducting analysis. This week I’m providing a bit of a follow-through plan. Sort of. Or perhaps you can call it a guide for things of which you need before writing performance objectives. Call it what you want. I’ve made a doodle of some things you’ll want to analyze:

 

Less of a doodle and a bit more flow chart-esque am I right? Yeah. I know. Anyhow. What the heck do all of these things mean?

When working in the analysis phase, you may come in on any portion thereof, but the key things you need to analyze are:

• Your Audience – Who will be receiving the training? What prior learning experiences do they have? Do they need prerequisite knowledge?
• The Environment(s) – How will the training be delivered? Face-to-face? Online? Blended? Where will the audience be applying the training? If on the job, will they need a performance support tool? Will it need to be mobile-friendly? Will it need to be a stand alone training aid?
• The Job or Task – What is the job/task for which you are developing training? Break that task down into each individual sub-task. Don’t assume your audience will know how to complete ANY of the sub-tasks, unless you’ve been specifically told they have the knowledge, and determine how much information is required (for each sub-task) to achieve mastery of the task for which the training was developed.
• Content – What content is available? Once you’ve analyzed your audience, the environments, and the job or task, you will have a greater understanding of what content you will need. At this point, you can analyze the content that’s available and determine whether there are any gaps. If so, you can request or source the missing content.

I know these posts are a very brief primer (of sorts) about Analysis in Instructional Design, but they provide you with some primary information necessary for some forthcoming blog posts targeted at elements and strategies related to conducting analysis.

Stay tuned for next week’s post: Design Part 1 – EXCITING, I KNOW!

 

 

I’ve talked a bit about analysis before, but it recently dawned on me that there are a lot of components that fall under the umbrella of analysis, so I figured I’d channel my inner analyst and take a few weeks to delve a bit deeper into the topic of analysis.

Let’s Go! Analysis in Learning Development – A Refresher

Analysis is the highest level of course development. In it’s recommended format, this phase seeks to compile all information relevant to the project and 1) determine which delivery method will best display the content in a meaningful manner, 2) whether more information is required and from whom, and 3) high-level project goals.

Elements

Within this phase you may stumble upon several elements familiar to analysis (e.g. Needs Assessment, Instructional Analysis, Task Analysis, Environmental Analysis).

You can read about Needs Assessments here, and Task Analysis here.

The basic jest is that you want to collect all of the information you possibly can in order to ensure the training you’re planning to develop is 1) necessary, 2) relevant, and 3) informed. You want to thoroughly understand the performance requirements, who your audience will be, what they need to learn, and how that information will be relevant to their performance.

Strategies

There are many strategies for conducting analysis. For example, you might want to start at the end goal of the training and work backwards. This approach will allow you to identify the goal and then the steps or prerequisites required to get to achieve the goal. Another example might be to begin with a list of questions (e.g. who is the target audience? what is their prior learning? why is the training necessary?, etc.) and discover the answers to those questions in order to conduct a thorough analysis of the situation. You might wish to examine what the organization is currently doing and why it’s not working to determine a different way ahead that will work.

However you choose to analyze, just know that you’re doing very important legwork that may save you time once you get to the design and development, and certainly the evaluation phase of your course development.

Stay tuned for more on analysis next week!

 

Today I thought I’d talk about badges, because everyone likes to feel like they’re achieving something and badges are a great way of doing that.

Badges

What are badges? Well. You can probably relate to the badge reference when you think about the badges you or your friends received in brownies/girl guides/cubs/boy scouts, etc. These badges were received for achieving a certain criteria with regard to a specific goal. Take for example some of the badges I’ve achieved in the Articulate Insiders community (shown in the image above) – these badges were achieved by: finishing 50 challenges, completing 10 social media challenges, and providing a survey-style opinion. Another example you might be able to relate to: the gold stars your elementary school teacher provided on your assignments/activities for a job well done.

We see badges in many domains; for example, social (e.g. brownies/cubs) and technology (e.g. video games), but how do we begin to use badging in education?

Using Badging in Education

Badges can serve to motivate students to work harder to achieve course goals; individuals innately want to succeed, so receiving an ‘award’ of sorts for completion of an activity can make a world of difference when it comes to learner motivation.

To begin employing badging in your classroom, you will want to define goals to achieve the badges. These goals should align with your course goals and learning outcomes. Once defined, create a mode for delivering the badges. For example, in a face-to-face classroom setting, you may wish to use a physical leaderboard (e.g. a table created on bristol board of each student and each goal, with physical stickers or badges affixed to the board to indicate completion/progress). In an online course, you may wish to generate electronic certificates or an electronic leaderboard (similar to the one illustrated above) that displays each learner’s badges.

Resources

• Educause Learning Initiatives: Things you should now about…Badges
• Badge Alliance – Why Badges?
• How Badges Really Work in Higher Education by David Raths

Many Instructional Designers work in distance education (even if not directly linked to an institution), and I am one of those Instructional Designers. Within my full-time role, I assist in the development of online, hybrid, and blended courses. Within my quasi-full-time role, I develop e-learning for a variety of clients.

However, the term ‘distance education’ has taken a bit of a turn when it comes to its definition, so I thought it might be handy to discuss this. This week’s post was actually prompted by the move of our department to change their name to Online Learning, instead of Distance Education.

Distance Education

Depending on which generation you’re from, distance education could have very different meanings. Some folks may associate distance education with correspondence courses (aka snail mail coursework), broadcast courses (aka televised), or online courses. All of these associations are correct, as distance education broadly includes any educational format wherein the instructor and student are separated by geographic location and/or time.

At the institution I work at, they were a regional pioneer in distance education in the televised/broadcast format. We still have the ‘on air’ light in the department hallway! However, technology has facilitated a shift in delivery mode. We now offer distance education in online and multi-access (hybrid and blended) formats in order to cater to the needs of our students. While many programs are available entirely online, we’re always working to expand our current program and course offerings in an effort to enhance accessibility to a high-quality distance education experience.

With the emergence of Learning Management Systems (LMS’), synchronous technology (e.g. Skype, Blackboard Collaborate, Adobe Connect) and video and/or e-learning authoring technology, faculty members now have many options when it comes to developing their courses.

Distance education has become very popular over the last twenty years, and it’s certainly where education is moving simply because of how it addresses issues of accessibility and convenience. My graduate degree was completed entirely online (with the exception of one project that I painstakingly snail mailed in to a prof), and the experience I had prompted me to seek employment within higher education so I could become part of the distance education movement.

Do I think distance education will overshadow traditional education? No. There’s still a very large population of individuals who want the traditional experience perhaps due to preference or learning style, but it is great to have an option to study while not being tethered to a single location.

The only real con I would associate with distance education is that learners truly need to be self-motivated. Without that motivation, there is seldom someone else to hold the learner accountable, and it can be very easy to get off track. So when people ask me about distance education, I really cater it to the demographic. For example, it might not be the best option for first year students who have no prior experience with self-paced learning or no prior exposure to a college or university setting. At least not at the very beginning. If distance education is your only option as a first year student, that’s fine. Just know that you need to be organized and focused or things we’ll snowball out of control very fast.